Free League Publishing Moria – Shadow of Khazad-dûm™ Expansion for The Lord of The Rings™ Role Playing 5E, Adults, Family, Teens 14+ LOTR Hardcover Tabletop Fantasy Compendium

Tolkien is pretty hard to get right in a TTRPG, and Moria is probably the hardest thing of all. It seems ideal -- it's the original megadungeon, after all. But it isn't -- Moria is virtually abandoned; it isn't overflowing with monsters of all types. It is one gigantic tomb, a lost monument to dwarven grandeur. In fact, it is the exact opposite of a standard DnD megadungeon. I have been waiting, and dreading, for the Moria supplement. In the end, I think Fria Ligan's Moria is an excellent effort. It places Moria in its proper place, and stresses the emptiness, but at the same time focuses on the parts where things can, or are, happening. It is well designed, well laid out, well written, well illustrated, and features excellent cartography. In short, it is an excellent supplement for anyone who wants to take their party through the Black Pit.The book itself is 225 pages, with an included fold-out map that features both a top down and lateral view of Moria. On the reverse are rules, and a play aid, for implementing One Ring's combat positioning system in 5e, which I applaud. In the spirit of full disclosure, I admit that while I play a lot of 5e, I generally prefer Fria Ligan's One Ring version for Middle Earth. That said, the only difference in this supplement between the two are the monster stat blocks.Moria isn't a campaign, it isn't a mega-dungeon sandbox, and it isn't a source book. It's foremost site-based, but it is more like a city supplement, and I think that is the approach the Fria Ligan took. It starts with some history, provides some suggestions on how best to run games in Moria, and describes the importance of Moria to various factions in the world. It provides some new rules (none of which are hard to implement), as well as a small bestiary of new creatures. This takes up the first 67 pages.The meat of the supplement is 27 separate areas inside Moria, each with its own background, sub-location descriptions, a isometric map, and schemes and troubles (adventure ideas). These are just a small fraction of the space inside Moria, but they can easily form the nuclei around which a campaign could be constructed. And make no mistake, even at 225 pages, a DM using this supplement is going to need to do a lot of work to prepare for a game set here. But the tools are all here (including some random chamber and orc-band generators) to help out, and all of it feels very true to Tolkien.Hey, there's even 30+ pages of rules for a solo campaign in Moria, set during the time of Balin's effort to reclaim the mines. It's a ton of material, but the design and layout of the book is so good that it never feels overwhelming.If I have a criticism, it is that the 5e monster stat blocks for the NPCs aren't very interesting. They were created from the 2014 version of 5e, and the monsters all fall on the weak side, largely lacking interesting capabilities. Durin's Bane, in particular, is very underwhelming, lacking legendary actions or lair actions that might have distinguished it from a run-of-the-mill monster. I wasn't overly impressed with its One Ring iteration, but I am less impressed with the 5e version. This is mitigated, however, by the text around Durin's Bane, which is chock full of interesting ideas and questions for a DM to noodle over and from which to draw inspiration.In conclusion, I think this is an excellent production and I cannot recommend it enough. It is designed for its own eco-system, Middle Earth. It will not translate particularly well to standard 5e high fantasy campaigns. It is most definitely NOT a megadungeon, so don't pick this up expecting something like that. Instead, it is meant to be a deep and terrifying place, filled with death and horror. And also orcs. It is a place of a surprising amount of politics, social (and literal) backstabbing, and other exploitable situations by clever DMs and clever players. It's a living ecosystem in a dead place, and that is no mean feat. I highly recommend.

I have not made an opportunity to play this yet, so I can't comment on the playability of it, so my review will cover the material of the book.Moria is an interesting challenge for a GM to work into a game. The moodiness of the setting is based around the mysterious evil that lurks in the depths. But anyone who is the slightest bit familiar with LOR lore knows that the mysterious evil is the/a Balrog. You really can't have the amazing reveal of the mysterious Durin's Bane.In addition, the standard timeline setting of this D&D adaptation is prior to the fellowship entering Moria, so IF you want to maintain the classic storyline and leave the Balrog for Gandalf to fight, you have to be cautious with his use. You shouldn't have to worry about the party accidentally killing him off. His stat block is pretty impressive. He works best as a unnamed threat to be avoided, not fought. Hopefully your party has enough sense to "Fly, you fools" if the beasty makes an appearance. Otherwise you are probably looking a TPK.Aside from "the lair of the Balrog" Moria is also a great setting for its massive, creepy, "abandoned", sprawling tunnel systems. The book does a great job of providing you boilerplate text, random architecture generation, and dozens of plot hooks to create an adventure there. There are a lot of plausible storylines offered up beyond the "we must take a shortcut through to evil lair to avoid the evil mountain" reason of the books. There are ideas offered up for quick missions/raids into the tunnels as well as extended campaigns to try and clear areas, re-start mining or even to re-take the entire city from the evil.The book has a very nice map of the mountain included on the inside covers as well as a large fold-out version. I found the small area maps very well done and easy to roll in and out of adventures. I think they will make great supplements to any campaign, even if the party is not diving into the depths of Moria.The pages are thick and heavy and the covers are a nice high-quality stock. The art work above average and plentiful. There are some good creatures and NPCs to work into the game as well as lots of plot hooks to pull characters into the story.All in all, a very high-quality product. Even if I never end up using it in game, it is very interesting reading.

Mistakenly got this thinking it was for the One Ring system, but I play 5e too so this isn't a bad addition to my shelves.This book has amazing production quality, the art is absolutely lovely, and there's a fold out map of the mines of Moria that is GORGEOUS. Like, to the point I want to take it out and frame it.It includes a solo adventure if you want to run a dm-less game for yourself that I've only glanced over because I might try to do that for myself later so I didn't want to get too into it; I'll update once I do that.Also - despite my earlier mistake, I was pleased to find that it had rules to make 5th edition combat work more like the combat in the One Ring, which I really appreciated.And look, I love Tolkien, but I'm not an unending vortex of knowledge. I ran it past one of my friends who rereads the Silmarillion yearly for fun, and he was delighted by the details weaved into the text - so that's a big thumbs up from the biggest Tolkien nerd in my life.Over all - lovely, well worth the cost.

I'll state my bias up front: I would always prefer to run a Lord of the Rings game using The One Ring system, as it has strengths that suit the setting far better than D&D's. So I have a high bar for conversion books and I'm pleased to say that this one meets them. The monsters are a bit on the weak side (so I suggest mentally lowering their CR a bit) but otherwise this really keeps the LOTR feel in the d20 system. Moria is a vast tomb, which seems fully abandoned and empty at first, but there are secrets buried deep within its tunnels. The fold-out map is excellent and a huge help as well.